Grants8 | The most comprehensive grants search on the web

Grant Analysis

Purpose & Target

Core objective: Develop game-changing innovations to revolutionize future access to space and enhance the competitiveness of the European space industry.
Target recipient: Legal entities (natural persons, public or private bodies), including those without legal personality.
SECTOR-SPECIFIC: Space sector, specifically access to space technologies and solutions.
Geographic scope: Established in EU Member States; activities must be carried out within EU Member States.
Key filtering criteria: Focus on low-maturity, game-changing innovations that go beyond the current state of the art; excludes complete launch solutions.
Grant frequency: This is a one-time preparatory action/prize within the 2024 Work Programme.

Financial Structure

Total prize overall budget: EUR 5,000,000.
Prize amount per winner: EUR 950,000 for each of the five ranked winners.
Number of prizes awarded: 5.
Currency: EUR.
This is a reward prize; therefore, typical grant-cost eligibility, co-financing, or indirect cost policies do not apply.

Eligibility Requirements

Organization Type

Legal entities (natural persons, public or private bodies).
Entities without legal personality may exceptionally participate, provided their representatives can undertake legal obligations on their behalf and offer equivalent financial guarantees.

Establishment and Activities

Must be established in one of the EU Member States.
Decision-making center and activities related to research, development, manufacturing, and operations must be located in territories of EU Member States.
Applications must relate to activities carried out in Member States of the European Union.

Exclusions

Not subject to restrictions originating from Member States outside of the EU.
Entities subject to EU restrictive measures (e.g., under Article 29 of the Treaty on the European Union or Article 215 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU, or Commission Guidelines No 2013/C 205/05) are not eligible to participate.

Registration

Applicants must register in the Participant Register and be validated by the Central Validation Service (REA Validation) before the call deadline.

Application Process

Application Timeline

Submission session available from: 2025-05-13.
Application deadline: 2025-10-07.

Submission Method

Applications must be submitted electronically via the Funding & Tenders Portal Electronic Submission System.
Paper submissions are NOT possible.
Applications must use the forms provided inside the Submission System.

Required Documentation

Application Form Part A: Contains administrative information about the applicant organizations, to be filled in directly online.
Application Form Part B: Contains the technical description of the application, to be downloaded, completed, and then uploaded.
Applications (Part B) are limited to a maximum of 70 pages; evaluators will not consider any additional pages.

Supporting Materials

Applicants may be asked at a later stage for further documents (e.g., for legal entity validation, bank account validation, ethics review, declaration of honor).

Application Support

For help related to this call, contact: [email protected].
Additional support is available via the Funding & Tenders Portal FAQ (Submission of proposals), IT Helpdesk, and the Online Manual.

Evaluation Criteria

Innovation & Technical Excellence

Potential to revolutionize the future of access to space.
Innovations must go beyond the current state of the art for access to space.
Focus on low maturity innovations (new ideas, concepts, technologies, products, processes, or digital solutions).

Impact & Strategic Alignment

Contribution to improving the competitiveness of the overall European space industry.
Potential to spur interest, incite new collaborations, incentivize change, and attract new dynamic innovators to the area.
Ability to mobilize additional private investment for innovation.
Potential to generate solutions and encourage an EU innovative access to space ecosystem.
Capacity for developing or opening new markets in the access to space domain.
Alignment with the aim to achieve cheaper, more sustainable, agile, and resilient access to space.

Ethical Compliance

Adherence to the highest ethical standards and applicable EU, international, and national law on ethical principles.
Respect for basic EU values: human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law, and human rights (including the rights of minorities).

Compliance & Special Requirements

Regulatory Compliance

Activities must comply with the regulatory framework set out in Regulation 2024/2509 (EU Financial Regulation) and the basic act (Union Space Programme Regulation 2021/696).

Ethical and Value Standards

Activities must comply with the highest ethical standards and the applicable EU, international, and national law on ethical principles.
They must respect basic EU values, including respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law, and human rights (including minorities).
Prohibited activities include: aiming at human cloning for reproductive purposes; intending to modify the genetic heritage of human beings to make such changes heritable (with the exception of research relating to cancer treatment of the gonads); or intending to create human embryos solely for research or stem cell procurement.
Applications involving ethics issues will undergo an ethics review to authorize funding.

Project Scope Limitations

The prize is open to innovations from the whole supply chain contributing to the access to space domain, but it EXCLUDES complete launch solutions.

Innovation Focus

The prize specifically rewards 'low maturity innovations' that have the potential to 'revolutionize the future of access to space' by going 'beyond the state of the art' and are 'not yet available'.

Grant Details